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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25680454">You Need Therapy</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joyous32/pseuds/Joyous32'>Joyous32</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mercy! [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Anxiety, Attempted Murder, Canon-Typical Violence, Depression, Dream Pack (Raven Cycle), Dreams and Nightmares, Drinking, Drug Use, F/M, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Insomnia, Introspection, Joseph Kavinsky Lives, Joseph Kavinsky is His Own Warning, Kavinsky Loves Innuedos, Kavinsky Redemption Arc, Kinda, M/M, Male Homosexuality, Other, Rehabilitation, Slow Burn, Street Racing, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Swearing, TW at the beginning of each chapter as needed, Therapy, Underage Drinking, Underage Drug Use, Vomiting, coming to terms with sexuality, not between our boys, rovinsky</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 05:42:34</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>10,744</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25680454</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joyous32/pseuds/Joyous32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>In that split second, Ronan saved Kavinsky's life. And then he kept saving him until Kavinsky resembled something closer to a broken boy than one damned to hell.<br/>**<br/>“You need therapy,” Ronan grunted out.<br/>“Like another hole in the head.” Kavinsky mimed a gun pointed at his own head. He blew it up and mouthed, “bang.”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Joseph Kavinsky/Ronan Lynch, Richard Gansey III/Blue Sargent</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mercy! [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1862164</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>39</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Another Hole in the Head</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>TW: Vomiting<br/>Also, I'm a sucker for song quotes at the beginning of chapters. So, sue me.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“If I get high enough, will I see you again?”<br/>-<em>If I Get High</em>, Nothing But Thieves</p><p>“The world’s a nightmare,” Kavinsky claimed. Ronan grit his teeth, but made a split-second decision, throwing himself onto the car to pull Kavinsky down. And down they fell, just in time. Ronan could feel his hair singe as he dragged Kavinsky farther away from the car now engulfed in the dragon’s flames. Kavinsky kicked and screamed.</p><p>“What? What!” Ronan threw Kavinsky to the floor once they were a safe distance from the burning Mitsubishi. Kavinsky moved to stand, but Ronan punched him down. “Call it off, Kavinsky! You’ve lost!”</p><p>Kavinsky breathed roughly when Ronan dragged him to his feet and shoved him against a car by his collar. The dragon was heading back toward them. Ronan was unsure which of them Kavinsky had sicced it on. “If you don’t call it off, we both die, K.”</p><p>Kavinsky gave a choked laugh. “You think I care?” He demanded. Ronan twisted Kavinsky’s head to stare down the fiery beast that grew larger by the second.</p><p>“<em>Now!</em>” Ronan growled in his face, slamming him bodily against the car once more.</p><p>“Stop,” Kavinsky huffed out. Ronan could feel the heat emanating from the dragon as it paused midflight above them. Its wings batted the air before it finally turned and flew off, a star against the black sky.</p><p>Ronan tossed Kavinsky back onto the floor and stepped toward him. Kavinsky crawled back. “It’s gone! It’s gone!”</p><p>Ronan slammed his fist into the other’s face. “I don’t care.” </p><p>“<em>Ronan</em>!” He heard Gansey from somewhere behind him.</p><p>Ronan hit Kavinsky again. <em>He kidnapped Matthew.</em> He knelt down beside Kavinsky to continue beating on him. <em>He stuffed him in a trunk.</em> Another hit. <em>He threatened Matthew’s life.</em> Another. <em>And Ronan’s.</em></p><p>Gansey was there suddenly, yanking Ronan off of Kavinsky. “You know what he did!” Ronan snapped at Gansey.</p><p>“Cool it, Ronan. I know, I know,” Gansey whispered. A crowd was forming around them.</p><p>“Where’s Matthew?”</p><p>“I’m here.”</p><p>And here was Kavinsky. On the ground, sobbing in a mess of his own blood. Within seconds, Prokopenko arrived and carted Kavinsky up, carrying him away from the crowd.</p><p>Ronan didn’t care. He didn’t care.</p><p>
  <em>He didn’t care.</em>
</p><p>He tried to convince himself that he didn’t care.</p><p>He turned back to wrap his arms around Matthew, squeezing the boy close. “You’re okay.” There was a question somewhere in that statement, and Matthew knew it.</p><p>“I’m okay,” Matthew repeated hoarsely. Ronan winced, wondering how long Matthew had been in that trunk, screaming for aid. How had nobody heard him? Even in all this?</p><p>“God, I’m never letting you out of my sight,” Ronan breathed out.</p><p>***</p><p>Ronan did, in fact, eventually let Matthew out of his sight. Matthew wouldn’t have it any other way. He had lacrosse practice. And he liked his dorm, while Ronan had no intentions of hanging around Aglionby any longer than he had to.</p><p>Instead, Ronan kept annoyingly close tabs on Kavinsky. Gansey was impressed with the way Ronan managed this. A dream tracker on Kavinsky’s Mitsu with a hidden camera to be sure that it was Kavinsky driving the car. Kavinsky’s phone calls were monitored, though Gansey still hadn’t gotten Ronan to explain how he managed that. All the information Ronan kept on Kavinsky was on his phone, so Ronan was uncharacteristically never seen without it.</p><p>Until one night, Ronan stormed into Monmouth and tossed his phone onto Gansey’s desk. “He’s in rehab.” Ronan continued off to the kitchen-bathroom.</p><p>“What?” Gansey grunted, pushing his glasses up his nose as he fiddled with the roof on a building for his model Henrietta.</p><p>“The bastard checked himself into rehab,” Ronan shouted, but then reappeared with a beer in hand. He flounced down onto Gansey’s bed.</p><p>“You think he’ll stay?” Gansey asked.</p><p>“He checked himself in. If he leaves, we’ll know.” Ronan gestured to his phone. So, Ronan wasn’t done with his obsessive hold on his phone—just taking a break from it. Part of Gansey was relieved. He enjoyed being able to contact Ronan at all times. Even if Ronan didn’t answer when he called, he knew Ronan read the text messages. Ronan wasn’t tech savvy enough to remove the ‘READ’ receipts.</p><p>“This is a good thing, yes?” Gansey asked, removing his glasses to look over at Ronan.</p><p>“I don’t care,” Ronan answered too fast. Gansey nodded as if he believed him. “It won’t work.”</p><p>Coming from Ronan, this statement seemed a little damning. Nobody thought anything good of Kavinsky, but at least Ronan defended the boy’s eventual future. “I thought it was your job to believe in him?” Gansey pointed out.</p><p>“It’s my job to be realistic.” Ronan took a swig of the beer and coughed when it went down the wrong pipe. “He’s not getting off the coke and shit without some honest-to-god therapy. Maybe some other pills. Shit, I don’t know, like anti-depressants actually prescribed to him. Rehab’s got too many rules he won’t be willing to follow.”</p><p>And sure enough, within a week, Kavinsky was back on the road again. Suddenly, Ronan was seeing him everywhere. If Ronan was on the road, Kavinsky was close behind. Ronan had searched his car and the Pig early one morning, checking that Kavinsky hadn’t placed a tracker on <em>their</em> cars in return. He came up with nothing.</p><p>Rather than join him at Nino’s, Kavinsky would drive by, pulling his glasses down with his middle finger to stare at Ronan and sneer, “fag.” It was the most Kavinsky ever spoke to him—one worded insults. Ronan would reply in kind or completely ignore him.</p><p>Until, he pulled up beside Ronan at the gas station one day. “Hey, fucktard. How’s your dream bro?”</p><p>“How’d rehab go?” Ronan shot back, and Kavinsky barked out a singular laugh before taking a drag from his cigarette.</p><p>“It didn’t stick. Most things don’t. Don’t know why I tried.” Kavinsky tossed the lit cigarette out the window.</p><p>“You need therapy,” Ronan grunted out, but didn’t turn away from his own car.</p><p>“Like another hole in the head.” Ronan finally glanced back to see Kavinsky miming a gun pointed at his own head. He blew it up and mouthed, “<em>bang.”</em></p><p>“You’re a fucking mess,” Ronan commented with one eyebrow raised.</p><p>“You go, I go.” Kavinsky gave him a Cheshire smile.</p><p>“I don’t need it,” Ronan growled.</p><p>“Mr. My-Dad-Got-Murdered-And-Now-I-Have-Self-Destructive-Tendencies doesn’t need therapy?” Kavinsky gasped. “What was happening in your suicide dream, Lynch? Those were some pretty precise cuts.”</p><p>“Fuck you.”</p><p>“Anytime, Lynch,” he cackled.</p><p>***</p><p>Kavinsky was following them around town, leaning on his horn. Blue and Noah had their fingers in their ears, while Adam glared at Ronan, and Gansey good-naturedly ignored Kavinsky’s existence. Chainsaw was squawking along with the horn blaring. Ronan had a feeling Kavinsky was itching for a fight, but he, in contrast, was too tired to care.</p><p>Finally, they pulled into the grocery store parking lot. Kavinsky pulled in as well and parked. He stepped out of his car and sauntered around to the front of it. Then he leaned against it, his arms crossed with a smirk on his face.</p><p>“Go ahead.” Ronan nodded to the store when Gansey looked at him.</p><p>“I am not leaving you out here alone with Kavinsky. We’ll wait here.”</p><p>“I won’t be alone. I’ll be with Kavinsky.” Ronan pointed out with a raised eyebrow.</p><p>“I’ll wait for him. You go on ahead,” Adam offered. Ronan didn’t protest, so Gansey agreed, leading Noah and Blue in.</p><p>“Stay here,” Ronan snapped at Adam, who shrugged and leaned against the Pig in an identical stance to the one Kavinsky held. Ronan rolled his eyes and told Chainsaw to stay with Adam. He wasn’t sure why the bird listened. But at least Adam wouldn’t give him disapproving looks when Ronan returned from Kavinsky. At least Adam was less likely to intercede if Ronan decided to hit Kavinsky. At least Adam would give them some distance.</p><p>“Master lent the leash to Trailer Trash? Why, he lonely? Need a bitch of his own?” Kavinsky slurred when Ronan approached.</p><p>“Do you even understand the shit spewing out of your mouth?” Ronan countered. “Why are you stalking me?”</p><p>“Me stalk you?” Kavinsky looked affronted by the accusation, hands over his heart. “I’m not the one putting trackers on people’s cars.” He held his hands out in a wide gesture. “You’re ignoring me. And I don’t like it.”</p><p>“I’ve got a tracker on your car,” Ronan reminded him.</p><p>“Is that what we’ve come to?”</p><p>“Would you rather I kick your teeth in?” Ronan snapped.</p><p>“Oh, sweetheart, you can try.” Kavinsky’s smile showed Ronan the boy’s molars. “Of course there’s another part of you I’d rather have my—”</p><p>“Why don’t you go piss off your own friends?”</p><p>“Nah, man. They’re boring. Everything’s so boring. They’re predictable!” Kavinsky gave a loud cackle on which his voice caught.</p><p>“And?”</p><p>“Well, you sure as hell aren’t,” Kavinsky practically slurred.</p><p>“Do your friends know you’re gay?” Ronan asked, and Kavinsky paused as he took in Ronan’s words. Then he guffawed.</p><p>“See? Unpredictable.” Kavinsky pushed off the car to wrap his hands around the arms of Ronan’s muscle tee. He moved to lean his face toward Ronan’s, and that was that.</p><p>Ronan punched him in the face and Kavinsky fell back against the car, not quite ending up on the floor, though his glasses did. First, Kavinsky vomited. Then, Kavinsky gave an aborted snarl as he stood once more to punch at Ronan, who easily caught his fist and shoved him against the car so that Kavinsky was sitting on the hood.</p><p>“How high are you?”</p><p>“What do you care?” Kavinsky spat blood and vomit at him. Ronan wiped it off his cheek and onto Kavinsky’s white shirt.</p><p>“Don’t want you to wreck that car because you’re being an idiot.” Kavinsky wrapped his free hand around the back of Ronan’s neck.</p><p>“Sweetheart, I can make hundreds more.” Kavinsky leaned forward as if to rest his head against Ronan’s shoulder, but Ronan held him too far away.</p><p>Kavinsky ended up with his head hung between them as Ronan leaned down to whisper in his ear, “you can get better.”</p><p>Kavinsky’s head rose to look Ronan in the eye for a millisecond. “Better,” he scoffed. “What if I don’t want to?”</p><p>“You like vomiting ‘cause you’re too high to take a hit?” Ronan snapped.</p><p>“Take a hit of—” Ronan didn’t hear the rest Kavinsky mumbled.  </p><p>“Gimme your phone.” Ronan held out his hand. Kavinsky handed it to him in silence, most likely curious as to what Ronan wanted with it. Ronan dialed Jiang’s number, deciding that the asshole was the least likely of Kavinsky’s friends to be high currently. “Come pick up your man-child and don’t let him drive this high again.” Ronan gave him the address and hung up, handing the phone back to Kavinsky.</p><p>“I can’t drive <em>not</em> high,” Kavinsky pointed out.</p><p>“Not <em>this</em> high.”</p><p>“Fucking bet.”</p><p>“Where are your feet, K?” Kavinsky leaned over to find them and would’ve ate it if Ronan hadn’t caught him. Ronan dug the keys to the Mitsu out of Kavinsky’s pocket and waved them in Kavinsky’s face. Kavinsky reached for them, but Ronan pocketed them and shoved Kavinsky away when the boy tried to nab them.</p><p>“Fuck you!”</p><p>“Go to therapy!” Ronan called over his shoulder as he walked away, and Kavinsky just cackled.  </p><p>“You took his keys?” Adam raised an unimpressed eyebrow when Ronan met him halfway to the front of the store. Chainsaw flew onto his shoulder from Adam’s.</p><p>“He’ll dream new ones.” They were met with Gansey and the crew at the door, so they turned around. Gansey’s eyes widened as he looked over to where Kavinsky was standing, flipping them off and doing some weird dance.</p><p>“I thought you said you’d watch him,” Gansey addressed Adam.</p><p>“I did.” Adam took a bag from Blue.</p><p>“Watching typically implies avoiding violence.”</p><p>“I figured I’d let him get it out of his system.” Adam shrugged and Ronan smirked.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Broken Record</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>TW: Suicidal thoughts</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“There's a hunger in my heart, it's full of promise, promise.<br/>
There's an itch under my skin, it's under my skin, under my skin.<br/>
I just want to feel something real.”<br/>
-<em>Itch, </em>Nothing But Thieves</p><p>“<em>Lynch</em>”</p><p>“<em>Lynch</em>”</p><p>“<em>Lynch</em>”</p><p>“<em>Lunch</em>”</p><p>“<em>Not lunch. Lynch hahaha.</em>” That was the last text in the thread for a while. There wasn’t a doubt in Ronan’s mind that he’d hear from Kavinsky again, though.</p><p>Ronan had seen Kavinsky on the road since he had taken Kavinsky’s keys, so he knew Kavinsky had dreamt some new ones. Gansey continued to encourage Ronan to leave Kavinsky alone, but his tone had changed from warning to pitying. Even though the pity was for Kavinsky, it made Ronan angry.</p><p>“<em>Lynch</em>.” Kavinsky was never one to disappoint. This text was followed by a stream of consciousness about what Kavinsky wanted to do with Ronan. Ronan’s face went red as he deleted those.</p><p>“<em>Lunch, Lynch?</em>” Ronan had half a mind to inform Kavinsky that it was already well into the evening, but he knew that no pestering would wake Kavinsky up to the real world at the moment.</p><p>The next text came deep in the night. “<em>What if I got to your vacant dream bro again? You aren’t very careful with him.</em>”</p><p>Ronan’s blood went cold. Realistically, there was no way Kavinsky evaded all of Ronan’s cameras and trackers, but what of his friends? Ronan didn’t have them tracked.</p><p>Ronan called Matthew. No answer.</p><p>He called Declan, who did. “Ronan? What’s wrong?”</p><p>“Where’s Matthew?” Ronan snapped.</p><p>“He’s right… Matthew. Matthew!” There was a thump like a pillow hitting someone and then a groan that clearly came from Matthew. “He’s here. What’s your iss—”</p><p>Ronan hung up and texted Matthew to take his phone off silent.</p><p>Then to Kavinsky, “<em>piece of shit, that isn’t funny</em>.”</p><p>“<em>It is when it gets you all worked up dreamer boy</em>”</p><p>***</p><p>When Ronan saw Kavinsky the following day, skulking outside of Nino’s, he grabbed the boy by his collar and shoved him against the wall. “You don’t touch my shit,” Ronan hissed in his face. “You don’t talk about my shit. You don’t <em>think</em> about my shit. You got that?”</p><p>“Your ass-wipe baby brother know you think he’s sh—” Ronan slammed him against the wall again and Kavinsky grunted, his knees buckling so that Ronan was holding him up. He was practically weightless.</p><p>Ronan looked him over and realized he could see Kavinsky’s ribs through his shirt. Kavinsky’s glasses had fallen off somewhere in the scuffle, and Ronan saw his eyes looked permanently blackened. His cheekbones were protruding a bit more than normal. Ronan had a feeling the clear lack of sleep on Kavinsky’s face had something to do with why Cabeswater wasn’t acting up anymore. “When’s the last time you ate?”</p><p>“What are you, my mother?”</p><p>“Do you still need one? Huh? I thought you’d outgrown your parental dependence,” Ronan snapped.</p><p>“I was born independent,” Kavinsky bloviated.</p><p>“I’m pretty sure your mommy and daddy were involved somehow. Now listen here, you bastard—” Ronan shoved him against the wall again.</p><p>“Man, what have I been doing?” Kavinsky held his hands up in surrender.</p><p>“—go to therapy.”</p><p>“You sound like a broken record. Those things went out of style years ago, Lynch.” Kavinsky reached up to tap Ronan’s nose.</p><p>“Get your fucked-up mind figured out so you can get off those drugs.”</p><p>“I tried sober. It doesn’t like me.” Kavinsky’s eyes didn’t meet his. Or at least, they didn’t stay in place. Ronan guessed that this had less to do with the drugs Kavinsky was undoubtedly on and more to do with why Kavinsky was always wearing glasses. “Anyway, I’m not using up the dream place! Isn’t that what you wanted?”</p><p>“Not when you’re out of your mind.”</p><p>“The pills make me out of my mind!” Kavinsky pointed to his temples.</p><p>“Therapy will put you in your mind and then you’ll be able to get clean.” Ronan looked Kavinsky over and then dragged him into Nino’s.</p><p>“What the fuck, man—” Kavinsky complained as Ronan sat him down at a table.</p><p>“Wallet.” Ronan held out his hand. Kavinsky flipped him off with both hands. Ronan went for Kavinsky’s pants pockets.</p><p>“Keep it in your pants, Lynch. I don’t have it on me,” Kavinsky snapped. Ronan pulled out his own wallet and placed a twenty on the table.</p><p>“Buy yourself a pizza. Put a vegetable on it. Eat it and then go home.”</p><p>“Home is where the stash is, sweetheart.” Kavinsky rested his chin on his hands, propped up on his elbows.  </p><p>“Go home to sleep,” Ronan corrected.</p><p>“Sleep is where the pills are too.” Kavinsky smirked cockily. Ronan rolled his eyes and turned away to go sit with Gansey. “Aren’t you gonna keep me company?”</p><p>“Why the hell would I?” Ronan called over his shoulder.</p><p>“What’d I say?” Kavinsky called back, but Ronan didn’t turn back.</p><p>***</p><p>Gansey was pissing Ronan off. If it wasn’t something with Adam, it was something with Blue. At least Noah was silent about it all, though Ronan figured the ghost had a bit more to complain about.</p><p>Ronan had locked himself in his room only to discover he was out of beer. Now he was locked in his room without beer. He shoved his face in his hands and groaned. As if on cue, he got a text from Kavinsky.</p><p>
  <em>“Fairgrounds in twenty. I’ll bring the substances if you bring your sunny personality.”</em>
</p><p>Ronan just hoped that Kavinsky meant he was bringing alcohol.</p><p>He showed up at the fairground to find Kavinsky slamming a bat into the window of one of the Evos. It was taking some effort to even make it crack. “What the hell are you doing?” Ronan asked.</p><p>“Swear I accidently made these things bullet proof.” Kavinsky remarked, turning red when he saw Ronan.</p><p>“Nah man, you’re just weak as balls.” Ronan tossed the bag of sandwiches on the floor beside them.</p><p>“Fuck your mom.”</p><p>“When’s the last time you ate?”</p><p>“Blow your dad.”</p><p>“Gimme that.” Ronan held his hand out for the bat, and Kavinsky willingly handed it over. With one swing, Ronan shattered the glass. Kavinsky cackled, jumping up and down where he stood.</p><p>“Again! Again!”</p><p>“What are you, twelve?”</p><p>“Fucking smash it!” Kavinsky did something with his fists that he probably thought looked cool, but made Ronan wonder how many different drugs were coursing their way through Kavinsky’s veins.</p><p>“Did you bring me beer?” Ronan asked.</p><p>“Did you bring me money?”</p><p>“I paid for your last meal.” Ronan side eyed him.</p><p>“So? That was your choice.”</p><p>“You really haven’t eaten since then? That was three days ago.”</p><p>Kavinsky thought about this for a moment and then cursed. “Stop psychoanalyzing me, man.”</p><p>“Where are your friends?”</p><p>“Fucking each other.”</p><p>“See, this is why no one wants you around.”</p><p>“I’m not wrong.” Kavinsky held his hands up in surrender. “Then why do you keep coming back?” Kavinsky changed his tactic. He fumbled around inside the car through the shattered window and came up with two beers.</p><p>“I haven’t come back anywhere besides here. You’re stalking me now.”</p><p>Kavinsky cackled. “You could’ve walked away. You always can.” He took an obnoxious gulp of the beer and then burped. “But you won’t. It isn’t your personality.”</p><p>“I thought you said I’m unpredictable.” Ronan picked up the bag of sandwiches and handed one to Kavinsky, trading it for a beer.</p><p>“In the right ways. That would be a wrong way.” Kavinsky pointed at Ronan and then poked him.</p><p>Ronan glared at Kavinsky until he bit into his meatball sandwich. When Ronan was sure that Kavinsky was going to eat the sandwich and not throw it somewhere, he jumped into the passenger seat of the car he had just smashed. Kavinsky brushed the glass off the driver’s seat, but cursed and gave up when he ended up with miniscule glass particles in his hand. Instead, he threw the case of beer into the backseat and sat without a care to the crunching under his ass.</p><p>“Do you still wanna die?” Ronan blurted and Kavinsky had the presence of mind to look surprised at this turn of conversation.  </p><p>“Is that a threat?” Kavinsky asked, burping again.</p><p>“It’s a question,” Ronan answered. With that, Kavinsky went quiet and Ronan figured the conversation was over.</p><p>“I want to escape reality. I’ve got my dreams and blow for that. ‘Suppose. Though you want to take my dreams away from me.” Kavinsky gave a dramatic sniff.</p><p>“Just don’t overdo it, asshole. How you’re dreaming now is fine,” Ronan stated, even though he knew it wasn’t. Kavinsky clearly needed more sleep, but there were steps in convincing Kavinsky to sleep without stealing.</p><p>“And then one day they won’t be enough. Guess that’ll be the day I off myself.” Kavinsky guffawed.</p><p>“It’s not a joke.”</p><p>“I’m the one telling it and I say it is.” Kavinsky’s Jersey accent was becoming more and more pronounced. Ronan tensed where he sat, gritting his teeth.</p><p>“What is this, kindergarten?”</p><p>Kavinsky proceeded to let out a slew of expletives no kindergartener would ever know. Ronan let him continue, waiting to see how long it would take for Kavinsky to run out of steam. It was intriguing to see what he’d come up with for three straight minutes.</p><p>“Convince me,” Kavinsky finally decided.</p><p>“Of what?”</p><p>“To want to live. You say I shouldn’t want to die.” Kavinsky waved his hand in the air and dropped a meatball on his lap.</p><p>“I never said that.” Ronan raised an eyebrow as he watched Kavinsky pick it up and eat it, breathing out roughly like it was too hot.</p><p>“No? Are we on the same page then?” He coughed and then washed it back with another swig of beer.</p><p>“I don’t want to kill myself.” Ronan glared.</p><p>“That’s not what I said, but it’s funny that that’s what your little mind jumps to.” Kavinsky stabbed a finger at him.</p><p>“Fuck you.”</p><p>“Again with the fucking. I tell you, Lynch, when you’re serious, let me know.” Ronan almost said, <em>fuck you</em>, again, but then thought better of it. “Do you want me to die?” Kavinsky asked in the silence, and Ronan felt as if gravity had suddenly collapsed on top of him.</p><p>“Jesus, K, no.”</p><p>“Hm.” Had the drugs worn off? Or had Kavinsky been overdramatizing how high he was?  </p><p>“You know, you could be something.” Ronan hated himself for the words as soon as they left his mouth. He sounded like Gansey. He sounded like <em>Declan</em>. But he had to try something. Nobody else was going to help this pathetic fucker.</p><p>“I’ll be whatever you want me to, baby.” Kavinsky licked his lips, but then saw that Ronan was ignoring that. Kavinsky rolled his eyes. “I could be so much more?” Kavinsky mimicked in a high-pitched voice and then scoffed. “There’s a conversation I never imagined having with anyone.”</p><p>Ronan felt like his own teeth were being pulled. “You could do something with your life that will …make you happy.”</p><p>“I’m happy.” Kavinsky scrunched up the paper wrapping that the sandwich had come in and tossed it out the shattered window.</p><p>“Happy people don’t dose themselves to high heaven every day.”</p><p>“No, see.” Kavinsky leaned over the center console with his hands folded together mockingly. “You got it all wrong, Lynch. I’m happy because of this shit. Maybe it started out because I was sad.” The grin on his face suggested otherwise. “Boo-hoo, you know? Or bored. Probably bored. Whores only go so far. But then, when I’m dosed up, I can’t come down. If I come down, I’m out of it, you know?”</p><p>Ronan leaned away from him with his lip upturned. “You need rehab.”</p><p>“Ain’t never gonna work.”</p><p>“You need therapy.”</p><p>Kavinsky turned to face forward once more. “I thought this was my therapy. I told you my secrets, tell me yours.” Kavinsky downed the last of his beer, crushed the can, and tossed it out the window.</p><p>“Why the fuck would I tell you anything?” Ronan grumbled.</p><p>“If not Dick or me, is it Parrish that does it for you?” Ronan tried to hand Kavinsky the second sandwich. “That’s for you, sweetheart,” Kavinsky said with a side eyed glance behind his glasses and a jab of his finger. Ronan sighed, having hoped that Kavinsky would be too high to realize that he had already eaten.</p><p>“What does it matter?”</p><p>“What does it matter if I want to die?” Kavinsky pressed. </p><p>Ronan bit into the second sandwich and chewed slowly. “I don’t know.”</p><p>“What don’t you know, man? You don’t know shit.”</p><p>“What fucking does it for me, K. I don’t know,” Ronan sneered.</p><p>“You don’t know if Parrish turns you on? Then why are you so sure against the rest of us?”</p><p>“I’m—” <em>Not</em>. It would take another million years before Ronan would admit that willingly. Ronan wasn’t sure if he was still in the horny throes of his teenage years or if coming to terms with his sexuality had enunciated it.</p><p><em>It</em> being Gansey’s nose wrinkling to push his glasses up his nose when his hands were covered in glue. <em>It</em> being Adam’s hand movements when Ronan taught him how to drive stick. <em>It</em> being Noah’s arms around him to wake him from the night terrors and hold him as long as he needed. </p><p><em>It </em>being Kavinsky’s accent as it pitched and waned.</p><p>Ronan took another bite of the sandwich.</p><p>“Baby gay,” Kavinsky snorted, and Ronan whipped his head back around to glare at him.</p><p>“What the fuck?”</p><p>“You don’t know your right gay hand from your left gay hand.” Kavinsky held his hands out in front of him.</p><p>“Your poetic verbalism has done nothing for my comprehension of your bullshit,” Ronan snapped. </p><p>“Men are attractive. Do you know why?” Kavinsky leaned over the center console again and Ronan narrowed his eyes at him, expecting something obscene. Kavinsky tried and failed to muffle a laugh, “you don’t fucking have to know, that’s why—that’s what.” Ronan rolled his eyes and Kavinsky threw his head back in his chair as he cackled. “Just <em>feel</em> it! Don’t try to explain to yourself why you feel whatever it is. I’m the worst person for you, Lynch. Doesn’t mean I’m not hot as fuck.”</p><p>“You look like you’re dying.”</p><p>“And you look like a lesbian, to each their own.” Kavinsky snorted and Ronan felt like his eyes would roll into the back of his head. “The point is, you don’t have to have a singular person that epitomizes your sexuality, man. Goods can outweigh bads and vice versa. But then, there can be definite noes just like there can be definite yeses. So, tell me again, if Parrish is a maybe, am I a definite no?”</p><p>“Is Skov for you?” Ronan spat back.</p><p>“I’d do any of my friends,” Kavinsky preened.</p><p>“You’re a slut.”</p><p>“And you’re a blushing virgin. What’s new, Lynch?”</p><p>Ronan could sense that this conversation wasn’t going away even if he punched Kavinsky and walked away. Kavinsky would come back in a more public setting and ask if Ronan would do him.</p><p>“I don’t know what the hell you are,” Ronan answered, and Kavinsky whooped. “Why not race for a living?” Ronan changed the subject hard and fast, but Kavinsky finally let him.</p><p>“<em>For a living</em>.” Kavinsky chuckled. “Why do anything for a living when I’m living off dreams?”</p><p>“Why not professionally race cars for the fun and glory of it?” Ronan tried again and saw the gears whir in Kavinsky’s head.</p><p>“I’ll never get there.”</p><p>“You could,” Ronan insisted, and Kavinsky looked him over as if searching for the lie in Ronan’s tone. Ronan understood Kavinsky’s hesitance, feeling as though Gansey were using him as a mouthpiece.</p><p>“I’ll never. Gotta pass all sorts of drug tests, no?”</p><p>“You need therapy.”</p><p>“You are the most annoying broken record that ever did live in my life. You know that? Why don’t you go fuck yourself? Or better yet, find some other unfortunate miscreant to try to persuade that son of a bitch—”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Aaand please let me conclude this segment with the understanding that I am negative zero percent certain how attraction works as someone with no knowledge of her own sexuality, a most likely ace spectrum individual, so who even knows if Kavinsky’s argument made sense in light of his bias being “Ronan should like me because I want him to”. It took me way too long to figure out how to write this. If it doesn’t make sense just…ignore it, I guess.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Don'cha Hate it?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>TW: Suicidal thoughts</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“I'm an exception; it's hard to accept.<br/>Because I try to be happy, but then I forget.<br/>They tell me I need to chill. 'Man, it's all in your head.'<br/>Maybe I'm paranoid. I don't wanna be myself; it's making me so unwell."<br/>-<em>Soda</em>, Nothing But Thieves</p><p>“<em>Lunch, Lynch?</em>”</p><p> “<em>Sure.</em>”</p><p>It had been a week since they had last seen each other. Of course, this didn’t account for when Ronan saw Kavinsky driving by with obscene gestures hanging out of his car. But it had been a weird while since they spoke.</p><p>They ate mostly in silence at a burger joint, with the occasional jab at one another. “Do you wear those inside because you <em>like</em> looking like an asshole?” Ronan asked, but Kavinsky just chortled, pushing the sunglasses up his nose.</p><p>Both boys seemed happy for the quiet company. Ronan used the time to decompress, as well as wonder what Kavinsky was using the time for. A lot of what was said didn’t <em>matter</em>, and for some reason, Ronan was more than okay with that. It seemed that lately, every conversation with Gansey, or Adam, or even Blue seemed to hold some greater weight. Saying “your mom” after Kavinsky asked what he was doing last night didn’t matter.</p><p>“So, I was thinking,” Kavinsky said, and then he gave a long pause.</p><p>“Make a habit of it and then I’ll care,” Ronan finally grunted, and Kavinsky dramatically licked the juice oozing down from the burger onto his middle finger. “Well, shit, man, were you going to finish that sentence?”</p><p>“I just wanted to say thank you,” Kavinsky tossed his hands out dramatically.</p><p>“For what?”</p><p>“You saved my life. You know? You have to remember. It was a pretty memorable moment. At least for me anyway.” Apparently, Kavinsky had no one else for those weighty conversations. Ronan wasn’t sure why this didn’t annoy him.</p><p>“And then I beat the shit out of you.”</p><p>“Yeah, I kind of deserved that though.” Kavinsky scratched his neck. “Come on, man. Why’d you do it?”</p><p>“Do what?” Ronan stood to toss his trash and when Kavinsky walked away from the table without a care as to what was left on it, Ronan tossed Kavinsky’s too.</p><p>“Save my life. I tried to kill your dream bro. You could’ve just let me die. No one would’ve blamed you.”</p><p>“I wasn’t finished with you,” Ronan answered without looking at him. At least, this is what he had been telling himself. Kavinsky hadn’t been <em>allowed</em> to die yet.</p><p> “Then after you beat the shit out of me. Why didn’t you kill me then?” Kavinsky led the way into the parking lot. Ronan wasn’t sure what they’d do now. Whether they’d race. Or dream. Or just go to their own homes.</p><p>“We had a crowd.”</p><p>“And after that?”</p><p>“What are you trying to prove? I already said I don’t want you dead.” Ronan flipped off a driver who almost backed into him, and Kavinsky howled with laughter.</p><p>“Why not? Come on, man. Answer the question. You’ve been watching me. You could’ve gotten me alone.” Kavinsky pulled him away from the car when they realized that the driver was still backing up without a care to who was behind him.</p><p>“I’m not a killer.”</p><p>“Except when you are.” Kavinsky waved his finger in the air as if to reprimand Ronan. Ronan just blinked.</p><p>“I don’t know what you’re implying, K, but I’ve never killed anyone. That’s your gig.” Ronan wrenched his hand from Kavinsky’s.</p><p>“Nah, I’ve moved past that.” Kavinsky waved his hand nonchalantly.</p><p>“What, killing people? You want a reward?” Ronan sneered.</p><p>“From you, maybe.” Kavinsky grinned idiotically.</p><p>“Go fuck yourself.”</p><p>“I’d much rather if you were involved there, somehow.”</p><p>“Screw you.”</p><p>“Again—” Kavinsky made another vague gesture with his hand.</p><p>“Is this some sort of hero-worship you’ve got going on? I’ll gladly beat the shit out of you again if it means you’ll knock it off.” Ronan unlocked his car.</p><p>“Okay.” Kavinsky’s grin grew and Ronan rounded on him. He stopped just short of punching the other boy. Suddenly, he realized how much taller he was than Kavinsky. He thought back to when they had first met. Ronan was pretty sure he and Kavinsky had been the same size at one point.</p><p>“What the hell’s wrong with you?”</p><p>“What the hell’s wrong with <em>you</em>?”</p><p>“I’m not the one antagonizing people into hitting me.” Ronan reached up and removed Kavinsky’s glasses. Kavinsky grabbed his hand as he pulled them away and put them back on without complaint, but Ronan had already seen the black rings around Kavinsky’s avoidant eyes. “Who’d you convince to use you as a punching bag?”</p><p>“It didn’t take much convincing.” Kavinsky grinned, splitting his bottom lip open in the process.</p><p>“Use chapstick,” Ronan snapped.</p><p>“Yes, mother.”</p><p>“Fuck you.” Kavinsky just laughed. </p><p> ***</p><p>That night, Ronan didn’t hear his phone ringing. This was usual. His music was louder than sound should be in his earphones and he was up to a new record of beer bottles downed in under an hour.</p><p>It was Noah’s interference that made Ronan finally pick up his phone. “Ronan.” Noah removed one of his earphones to whisper in his ear.</p><p>“Shit, Noah!” Ronan flung his arms out but stopped just short of hitting Noah when he realized the boy was no threat.</p><p>“You should answer your phone.” Noah held it up to him just as the call ended.</p><p>“What? Why?” Ronan asked, wondering if this was some ghostly knowledge Noah had or if he was just being a bastard. He checked his missed calls. It was Kavinsky.</p><p>Kavinsky never called.</p><p>Noah stared a second longer and tilted his head in wonder at what Ronan would do next. Ronan called Kavinsky back. “’lo?” Kavinsky answered.</p><p>“Did you butt dial me?” Ronan asked, and Kavinsky just chuckled from the other end.</p><p>“It’s a booty call, Lynch. Stop using your thesaurus.”</p><p>“’the fuck you want, K?” Ronan snapped, rubbing his eyes.</p><p>“To hear your pretty voice, schlong.”</p><p>“I’m hanging up—”</p><p>“Would you care if I died?” Kavinsky interrupted.</p><p>“Jesus, K. <em>Yes</em>,” Ronan insisted without even thinking about it. Of course, he would.</p><p>Wouldn’t he?</p><p>
  <em>Yes.</em>
</p><p>Was he supposed to? From a moral standpoint, of course. From the standpoint of Matthew’s brother, maybe, not so much. From the standpoint of Gansey’s friend—</p><p>Ronan didn’t think about it.</p><p>“K? Joseph, what are you doing?”</p><p>“Coke.” Kavinsky’s voice popped. Nothing abnormal sounded in his tone. Maybe, he was just high. Maybe, that didn’t make a difference to the situation.</p><p>“Where are you?” Ronan pulled on his pants and then realized he couldn’t stand up without falling over.</p><p>“House.”</p><p>“Your house?” Kavinsky made a noise that neither denied nor confirmed. Ronan took it as confirmation.</p><p>“Go to bed,” Ronan spat, and Noah eased Ronan back onto his bed, resting his head on Ronan’s shoulder.</p><p>“Can’t sleep. Too high.”</p><p>“Stop doing coke.”</p><p>“Fuck that.”</p><p>“For tonight, at least. Don’t make me come over there and flush it all.” Noah rolled over to rest his head in Ronan’s lap. Ronan figured Noah probably thought he was being comforting. Ronan figured Noah wasn’t really wrong.</p><p>“I’d kill you.”</p><p>“What did we just talk about today?”</p><p>“Shit if I know. I was probably high.” Ronan felt that, while Kavinsky was probably correct in saying he was most likely high, seeing as the boy wasn’t functioning if he wasn’t high, it was probably the most alert Kavinsky had been in a while. “Hell, why do you care about me?”</p><p>“I don’t know, man, because you’re a person? You can be something.”</p><p>This is why Ronan hated phones.</p><p>“Don’t you hate it when people say that to you?” Kavinsky snorted.</p><p>“’Course I do.” Ronan grit his teeth. “But that’s because—maybe I don’t want to be what they want me to be. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to end up however they think I will.”</p><p>“Blowing me for drugs? You like walking that line.” Kavinsky accused and Ronan didn’t deny it. He got just to the edge of where Gansey and Declan thought he’d end up. He wasn’t going to end up dead in a ditch somewhere after overdosing and prostituting himself off to some drug lord. He’d <em>willingly</em> give his time to Kavinsky instead.</p><p>And he wasn’t going to some Ivy League college for their sakes. He didn’t want to. “Yeah, well, I like pissing people off.”</p><p>“Me too.”</p><p>“You can do that without becoming self-destructive.”</p><p>“Being self-destructive is what pisses people off. Tell me the truth, Lynch; would you spend a second of your time on me if you didn’t wonder every day whether or not I was gonna off myself?”</p><p>“It would be easier.” Ronan ran his hand over his face.</p><p>“Would it? Or would my sunny personality scare you off?”</p><p>“You’re more pathetic than a newborn kitten, K. Grow some, and maybe you’ll be able to scare me off.”</p><p>“It’s a figure of speech, moron.”</p><p>“If you—” Ronan rearranged his legs so that they were propped up on the bed and Noah grunted as he was forced to rearrange himself as well. “If you become something, all those people who think you’re going to die because of your drugs will be proven wrong. They’ll be pissed off at being proven wrong.”</p><p>“They’ll be just as pissed to be proven right,” Kavinsky claimed. Ronan sighed, wondering if there was some reason to Kavinsky’s logic, or if he was just as drunk as Kavinsky was high.</p><p>“Joseph, go to bed. I’ll see you in the morning. Alright?”</p><p>“Eh.”</p><p>“<em>K</em>.”</p><p>“Fine.”</p><p>***</p><p>The next morning, they had tacos for breakfast. Gansey was no longer scrunching his face up every time Ronan said he was going out with Kavinsky. Kavinsky was settling into a real person with guilt and reason alongside the lust and anger. Ronan was beginning to see how the feelings all related.</p><p>Ronan distracted Kavinsky from the cocaine for a while with cars and grappling and walks around town, but this ended with Kavinsky crashing by lunch. Ronan bought him a burrito and a beer all the same, and Ronan sat guard while he waited for the boy to rise.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Go Fuck Yourself</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>TW: References to non-con. </p><p>So I know it’s basically a given that Kavinsky fans who view him as a sympathetic character do NOT read his sentence “consent is overrated” as him taking without asking, but as someone taking from HIM without asking. I’m right there with you all, especially in the context of the statement. However, Maggie said K’s got consent issues, and I’ve accepted that challenge. He can still be sympathetic. Give our boy a chance.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"Sweetie, you need something better. Let me build you something better.<br/>
Heaven, it's lonely in your heaven.<br/>
Darling we should get together. I could worship you forever.<br/>
How do I tempt you... out of the city tonight?”<br/>
<em>-Tempt You (Evocatio)</em> by Nothing But Thieves</p><p>Ronan was beginning to spend as much time with Kavinsky as he was with Gansey and his crew. Ronan still got questioning glances from Adam and Blue, though Gansey avoided commenting. Noah would just hum and paw at Ronan’s shoulder when Kavinsky was brought up. Noah thought he was being comforting. Noah wasn’t normally wrong.  </p><p>Leaving Chainsaw with Gansey, Ronan and Kavinsky spent a long weekend out on the road, finding as many bars as they could that would let them in with Kavinsky’s forged IDs. Most of the bars in Henrietta knew better than accept an ID from Kavinsky or anyone with him, so they had ventured to towns beyond their own. They drank, slept, ate, and drove. Ronan wanted Kavinsky to eat and sleep, so Ronan assisted with the other two on condition.</p><p>By the end of the weekend, Kavinsky had some color to his cheeks, though Ronan had only stopped Kavinsky from doing drugs in excess. He had to be sure Kavinsky was at least functioning.</p><p>By Tuesday, Ronan was exhausted. As much as they had slept, it wasn’t enough. He told Kavinsky to fuck off for a few days while he caught up on some sleep. Of course, Kavinsky ignored him.</p><p>That night, Ronan woke to the sound of an engine out front. He recognized it as Kavinsky’s Evo. Ronan glanced out the window to find the vehicle doing donuts in their parking lot. Chainsaw was having a fit in her cage, clearly sensing that someone was having fun without her. Ronan rolled his eyes and headed downstairs, Chainsaw on his shoulder.</p><p>“Ah, Ronan. Seems you have a visitor,” Gansey informed him as he applied glue to some cardboard.</p><p>Ronan chewed on the inside of his cheek as he stepped out into the moonlight. “What are you doing, asshole?” Ronan shouted, and finally Kavinsky stopped to look at him.</p><p>“Can’t sleep!” He called.</p><p>“Well I can! Go home!” Ronan yelled back, but Kavinsky continued fucking around. Ronan slammed the door as he walked back inside. He considered calling the cops but decided against it. Instead, he sat down beside Gansey.</p><p>“You sure know how to pick ‘em,” Gansey commented.</p><p>“That’s what everyone thought when you adopted me, man.” Ronan grunted as he leaned his chin against Gansey’s shoulder.</p><p>“How’ve I done?” Gansey asked Ronan, but Ronan just grumbled to himself.</p><p>Noah appeared perched on Gansey’s bed. “Pretty alright.” He grinned and Gansey smirked at that, but didn’t look up from his work or address Noah.</p><p>“How’ve you done?”</p><p>“Don’t know yet.” Ronan lay down on the floor beside Gansey and yawned.</p><p>“Go back to bed,” Gansey chuckled.</p><p>“He gone yet?” Ronan picked his head up for a moment and then heard loud cursing outside. He rolled his eyes as Gansey grumbled under his breath.</p><p>Kavinsky banged against the door and Ronan practically growled. Ronan stood and yanked the door open. “I’m bored,” Kavinsky said.</p><p>Ronan gestured to his sunglasses that were still on his face. “Come on, man. At night? Really? Can you even see?”</p><p>“What’s with your vendetta against my sunglasses?” Kavinsky adjusted them playfully.</p><p>“Why are you wearing sunglasses when there’s no sun? Dumbass.” Kavinsky just chortled. Ronan rolled his eyes. “Go to sleep. We didn’t get nearly enough of it this weekend.”</p><p>“I slept in the car.”</p><p>“You did drugs in the car.”</p><p>“Low blow, man.” Kavinsky held a hand over his heart and then jerked his finger over to the car behind him. “One more drive.”</p><p>“You’ll always say that.”</p><p>“And you’ll always say yes.” Kavinsky grinned and Ronan sighed, realizing he wasn’t wrong. He slammed the door in Kavinsky’s face to put on some actual clothes.</p><p>“You don’t have to go.” Gansey pointed out and Ronan shrugged.</p><p>“One more drive won’t kill me. Still summer; I can sleep in.”</p><p>“You would anyway,” Noah chirped, and Ronan flipped him off as he exited Monmouth, Chainsaw still mounted on his shoulder. He figured it was time the two met.  </p><p>“My car,” Ronan called, and Kavinsky conceded.</p><p>And so, Ronan drove. It was fast because when wasn’t it? There were less jerky movements because Kavinsky was not driving, leading to smooth sailing all the way to the edge of town. Nobody else was awake at this time of night, so there was no one for Kavinsky to flip off. No one for him to egg Ronan into racing or cutting off.</p><p>Instead, Kavinsky was preoccupied with Chainsaw. She hopped onto his shoulder and he cursed, but after a few attempts at biting his fingers off, she let him pet her until she got bored. She flapped her way passed Ronan to his opposite shoulder so Kavinsky couldn’t reach her anymore. Ronan cursed as he went momentarily blind because of her wings, but he was long used to navigating with a loose bird in the car.</p><p>Then, Kavinsky spent his time tracing constellations out of the freckles on Ronan’s arm as Ronan shifted gears between them. </p><p>Little did Kavinsky know, Ronan was showing him the Barns. His home. Ronan reached the edge of the Barns, found a hill overlooking it and stopped there. He rolled down his window so Chainsaw could fly around a little before turning off the engine. “Why are we here?” Kavinsky asked, peering out across the Barns. At some point, Kavinsky had removed his glasses, and now he was fidgeting with them in his lap.</p><p>“This is where I grew up.” Ronan pointed down the hill. He trusted that Kavinsky wouldn’t go vandalize the place. At very least, Kavinsky would have had to been paying attention to the road beyond the speed at which they were traveling.</p><p>“A farm,” Kavinsky commented, and looked back to Ronan.</p><p>“I’m going to be a farmer,” Ronan informed him, and Kavinsky gave the Barns another fleeting glance before staring instead at Ronan. Ronan wasn’t sure if there was weight in Kavinsky being the first person he told his plans, or if it meant the statement lacked depth.</p><p>“Why?” The disgust was clear in Kavinsky’s voice, but Ronan couldn’t take it personally. He held the same disgust for Adam’s longing to get into Harvard.</p><p>“Because I fucking want to be.” Ronan shrugged. “And you’re going to be…a racecar driver?” He suggested and Kavinsky actually seemed to think this over. Ronan didn’t break eye contact as, for the first time in a long time, it held without some tint. Finally, Kavinsky furrowed his eyebrows together and shrugged, looking down from Ronan’s eyes.</p><p>“Since when do you care so much about the future anyway?” Since Kavinsky almost killed himself. Since Ronan realized that life really was <em>that</em> fragile and you had to do your best with it. You had to do what you wanted with it.</p><p>“We only have so much time. Let’s not waste it,” Ronan suggested. Kavinsky looked him over and then leaned over the center console as if to kiss Ronan. Ronan stopped him, his arm coming up between them. “Not when you’re high.”</p><p>“I’m always high.” Kavinsky sat back down in his own seat and glared.</p><p>“Then I guess it’s never happening.” Ronan gave him a pointed glance.</p><p>“You can’t convince me sober by promising your body.” Kavinsky mimicked the glance.</p><p>“I haven’t promised anything and definitely not that.” Ronan’s face turned red, but he doubted Kavinsky could tell in the moonlight.</p><p>“Not your <em>body</em>?” Kavinsky leaned closer again as he enunciated. “You can say it.”</p><p>“I don’t have to convince you to get sober, anyhow. The thought’s already planted in your head.” Ronan tapped Kavinsky on the forehead.</p><p>“How would you know that?”</p><p>“You tried rehab.”</p><p>“And hated it.”</p><p>“The first step of solving your problem is admitting you have one.” Kavinsky lifted his fist as if to punch Ronan, but Ronan threw his arm up in the way again. There wasn’t room in the car for much else. “No!” Ronan shouted, and glared as Kavinsky seemed to jolt himself back into reality. “Really, K?”</p><p>Kavinsky clenched and unclenched his fist and then shoved his face in his hands. “I know. I know I’m fucked up.” He wiped at his eyes and put his glasses back on, turning to face the passenger window.</p><p>“’Least you fucking recognize it,” Ronan grumbled and started up his engine once more. He called for Chainsaw and she came soaring back into the car, seated on Kavinsky’s lap. Kavinsky didn’t say another word as they headed back into town. </p><p>***</p><p>“Do you ever regret trying to kill my brother?” Ronan asked one afternoon as they sat around the fairgrounds, a blunt each. Marijuana was their gateway drug—that is, the drug where they met halfway. Ronan wouldn’t do drugs stronger and Kavinsky wanted something with a kick, though Ronan still wasn’t sure if weed actually gave it to him at this point.</p><p>“No,” Kavinsky answered too easily, and Ronan turned to glare at him.</p><p>“Fuck you, man.” Ronan moved to stand, but Kavinsky reached his hand out to shove Ronan back to the ground.</p><p>“I’ve got your attention,” Kavinsky attempted to clarify and Ronan stared for a while longer before finally deciding he understood. He wasn’t sure if he was riding a superiority complex, or if Kavinsky really had just claimed his life was better with Ronan in it.</p><p>Kavinsky’s hand hadn’t moved from Ronan’s chest. Ronan shoved it off, but Kavinsky pulled his hand back to Ronan’s shoulder until Ronan finally slapped him off.</p><p>“Get off me, you asshole.”</p><p>“I want you,” Kavinsky said with no hesitation.</p><p>“I already said no.” There was no way to hide how red Ronan’s face was this time.</p><p>“I don’t care. Consent is overrated. Didn’t I already tell you that?” Kavinsky turned toward him with a fiendish grin.</p><p>“One of your daddy’s friends teach you that?” Ronan spat and watched as Kavinsky’s face went whiter than Ronan ever thought it could be. “If you didn’t like it too much, why are you forcing it on other people?”</p><p>“Other people deserve it,” Kavinsky growled.</p><p>“But you didn’t?” Ronan mocked, knowing his words were cruel. Out of anything Ronan had ever been cruel over, he decided this was not one he would regret. Kavinsky’s problems were his own, but when he spilled over onto other people, they weren’t just his problems anymore. He needed to get a handle on his own problems before someone else got hurt. Matthew had already come too close. Ronan had. And he could bet on his life that Kavinsky’s problems had rubbed off on others before.</p><p>“Eh, maybe I did. Anyway, I ain’t spilling my secrets to you, Lynch. Not ‘till you fess up to some of your own.”</p><p>“You need therapy.”</p><p>“Go fuck yourself.”</p><p>“God, your voice,” Ronan blurted before he could think about it. <em>Damn</em>, he was high.</p><p>Kavinsky raised his eyebrows and smiled like a dork, but he didn’t seem what else to say to that. At the moment, he was more sober than Ronan was, and he seemed to recognize this. Ronan still figured that comment would come back to bite him in the ass sooner or later. </p><p>It took a long time for either of them to talk again. Kavinsky was willing to drive under the influence, but Ronan chose not to. Kavinsky wasn’t going to leave when Ronan was here though. When Ronan came down later, Kavinsky was already back on cocaine. Ronan considered finding Kavinsky a hobby.</p><p>“I’m not sorry,” Kavinsky commented when Ronan stood and headed over to his car.</p><p>“Me neither,” Ronan responded and gestured to his car with his thumb. “Pizza?”</p><p>“Still stuffing my face, Lynch? You know I’d rather—”</p><p>“If you finish that sentence, my offer is rescinded.”</p><p>“‘Rescinded’.” Kavinsky mocked him but jumped into the passenger seat of Ronan’s BMW.</p><p>And so, they went to Nino’s and got pizza, talking about anything but consent and little brothers.</p>
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<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Yeah.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>TW: Suicide Attempt. Kinda recommend not reading this chapter if that's a problem. Read the end of chapter notes for a summary without too much detail.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><em>Get Better</em> by Nothing But Thieves</p><p>Kavinsky was giving a show of radio silence. Ronan knew he wasn’t mad about their argument at the fairgrounds because Kavinsky had been laughing by the end of their trip to Nino’s. Not a care in the world. Though, if Ronan had given him something to think about, he wasn’t going to feel bad about it.</p><p>But this was unusual. Kavinsky wasn’t trailing him everywhere he went. There was still another week before school started back up, but Kavinsky hadn’t said anything about traveling. Ronan tried reaching out to Kavinsky’s usual pack, but none of them were accessible either.</p><p>This went on for a few days before Ronan finally decided to do something about it—to Gansey’s relief. Ronan found Kavinsky’s address from an old party flyer, advertising all sorts of debauchery, and headed over.  </p><p>The Evo was out front, and the front door was unlocked and ajar. Part of Ronan expected some sort of trap like his own father would have concocted, but that wasn’t Kavinsky’s style. Inside, Ronan stopped and looked around.</p><p>He’d never been to one of Kavinsky’s house parties, despite Kavinsky’s taunts. Kavinsky hadn’t thrown a party since July fourth, which was to be expected. Ronan had no idea where anything was in this house.</p><p>He decided to start for the stairs, under the impression that bedrooms were probably upstairs. Maybe Kavinsky was passed out in own vomit after too much cocaine. That wasn’t exactly a promising thought. Ronan moved quicker, looking into rooms until he found one room clearly used by a teenage boy. Kavinsky wasn’t inside, but Ronan stepped in and looked around.</p><p>Then he saw the bathroom door shut. Since every other door in this house had been completely wide open, Ronan took this as an offense. “K?” He called, knocking on the door. He heard movement, but nobody called back. “Joseph?” Ronan called again and tried the doorknob.</p><p>Locked.</p><p>Luckily, Ronan had come with the assumption that Kavinsky locked doors. He pulled out a lock pick and had the door open in seconds.</p><p>“Shit. <em>Shit</em>!” Ronan entered the bathroom to find Kavinsky in a tub of his own blood. Ronan yanked the boy from the tub, shakily searching for the wounds from which this blood flowed.</p><p>His wrists…Kavinsky’s wrists…</p><p>Ronan wrapped towels around them and then pulled out his phone to dial 911. “You calling the cops on me?” Kavinsky slurred. They were both soaked.</p><p>“You awake, you bastard?”</p><p>“I don’t think I can do time for killing myself.” His face was too white. A flash of a smashed-in head made Ronan squeeze his eyes shut. Death was chilling and it remembered itself, even subconsciously.</p><p>“You’ll do time in a hospital,” Ronan muttered. “Hi, yes. I have a guy here bleeding out… From his arms, does it matter? …We’re at—<em>fuck</em>, what’s your address?” Ronan hadn’t brought the flyer, but rather he’d entered the address into his GPS and promptly forgotten it.  </p><p>“Don’t you have that shit memorized?” Kavinsky slurred. Ronan shook him, not entirely sure if it was wise to shake a dying person.</p><p>Kavinsky told him his address.</p><p>“Stay awake,” Ronan ordered once he had hung up. “Stay awake.” He shook Kavinsky again, applying pressure to the towels wrapped around Kavinsky’s wrists as the operator had suggested.</p><p>Ronan wanted to pull Kavinsky closer, inside himself, where there was some surety in life. Ronan wanted to run away and never look back.</p><p>“Jesus, shaking me like a ragdoll. Let me go, you bastard.” Kavinsky’s voice cracked.</p><p>And in this moment, Kavinsky’s dying form in his lap, his father’s corpse behind his eyelids, Ronan thought of Noah. And of Gansey. And what they must have thought when they found Ronan in such a similar position. He squeezed his eyes shut, allowing his father’s dead body to burn away the thoughts of Noah’s tearstained cheeks and Gansey’s strained voice that echoed in his ears.  </p><p>Kavinsky was so close. <em>So close</em>. To the edge of the end. To nothingness. Part of Ronan wondered how any relief came from this. Something so unknown was coming. A change beyond any humanity had experienced. Why did Kavinsky long for it?</p><p>“Are you scared?” Ronan asked wondrously, his voice cracking, though it wasn’t like Kavinsky was aware enough to tell.</p><p>Kavinsky gave a sound like a laugh. “Were you?” Ronan checked his eyes again. For the second time in a long time, they weren’t darting away from Ronan’s.</p><p>Ronan hated the sentimentality of it all. Kavinsky felt most confident in the dark, alone with Ronan, was that it? And now—what? Confident in death?</p><p>
  <em>Fuck. </em>
</p><p>“I was unconscious,” Ronan heard himself say.</p><p>“Lucky you. I’ve got some fool shaking me like I’m a margarita.”</p><p>“Was it on purpose, K?” Ronan insisted, suddenly wondering if this looked a little too familiar.</p><p>Kavinsky practically groaned, “I’m not you.”</p><p>And now? Well, now…</p><p>“You’re getting that fucking therapy, now.” Ronan held him closer to his chest, as if his own thrashing heart could beat some life into Kavinsky’s.</p><p>“You think I’ll live through this? How pess’mist…” Ronan grit his teeth and tried to ignore his churning stomach as Kavinsky faded.</p><p>“I thought I told you I didn’t want you to die. Did that mean nothing, you piece of shit?” Ronan raised his voice, trying to call Kavinsky back into consciousness. Away from unconsciousness.</p><p>“Guess I’m a contrary son of a bitch, aren’t I?” Kavinsky actually grinned.</p><p>“You stay the fuck awake; you hear me?” Ronan could hear the tears in his own voice, and he hated himself for it.</p><p>“But…I want to be gone.” Kavinsky looked sincerely confused.</p><p>“Do you? Right now? <em>Do you?</em>” Ronan demanded, and a sob broke through Kavinsky’s throat.</p><p>“It should be different,” Kavinsky whimpered.</p><p>“What?”</p><p>“Life.” Kavinsky squirmed a little, which Ronan took as a good sign. Ronan’s death grip on Kavinsky’s arms was making his hands cramp, which felt impossibly unimportant. “Death,” Kavinsky added.</p><p> Ronan forced himself to breathe, staring away from the boy slowly growing whiter in his arms. Everything was red-coated. He shut his eyes, but the black there was only worse.  </p><p>“Shows what you know.”</p><p>“Shows what I know.” Ronan glanced down at him again to see if Kavinsky even knew what he was talking about.</p><p>Within another few minutes, Ronan heard the ambulance pull up. He shouted for them so they’d find them quicker, and Kavinsky was pulled away from him.</p><p>Ronan vomited in the sink.</p><p>People asked him questions and he gave them short answers. They wouldn’t let him leave until he calmed down.</p><p>He was fucking calm.</p><p>He wanted to punch something.  </p><p>Finally, he convinced them to let him go, and he followed the ambulance to the hospital, updating Gansey over the phone on his way. Gansey immediately claimed he was on his way, which Ronan wasn’t sure if he wanted. He wasn’t sure it was his place to care.</p><p>When he reached the hospital, they asked how Ronan knew Kavinsky, and he never wanted to answer another question again. “I’m—I’m his friend. I found him like—” Ronan had never felt more like a child, trying not to cry out in his frustration.</p><p>He <em>needed </em>to punch something.</p><p>“If you wait here, we can update you on his condition, but we can’t allow you back there until we know he’s stable,” the nurse claimed.</p><p>Ronan paced and then sat down on a nearby bench. He was covered in blood. Right. The BMW was probably a mess too.</p><p><em>Shit</em>.</p><p>What if K died? Ronan knew enough not to blame himself, but it didn’t make it hurt any less. What were these past few weeks, a goodbye party? How long had Kavinsky been planning this? Had it been planned?</p><p>Was Ronan not enough? Did he have a right to <em>want</em> to be enough? What was he to Kavinsky? What more could he have done for Kavinsky? Why was he so broken up when Kavinsky was the one who had decided life wasn’t worth it? Clearly one of them had more reason to be upset.</p><p><em>No</em>, that wasn’t true.</p><p>Had Gansey thought that at the time? Ronan remembered watching Gansey stew in his own guilt. There had been no way of explaining to Gansey that it <em>wasn’t Gansey’s fault</em> beyond simply stating it. Beyond mentioning that people who tried to kill themselves rarely put the blame on any person, and that person was <em>never</em> their innocent best friend.</p><p>Ronan realized he had stood once more and was pacing. He was spiraling in his own head—<em>down, down, down</em>—so the pacing made sense. A nearby family was gawking. He was covered in blood—the gawking made sense too.</p><p>If only Kavinsky could start making sense. Ronan sat back down and held his head in his hands.</p><p>Gansey was coming.</p><p>***</p><p>Kavinsky’s attempt on his own life ended up less how he wanted it. Instead of dying, he landed himself in therapy. Dr. Sally Carter had issued a seventy-two-hour hold, forcing him to remain in the hospital. Luckily for him, he spent the first thirty-six hours heavily sedated after waking up at one point and attempting to remove himself from the premises rather violently—albeit weakly.  </p><p>Once he had woken again, Ronan was allowed back to see him, though, not without a guard standing by. Or, sitting by with a magazine. Kavinsky spent a while cursing out every person who had entered the door to his room in the past twenty-four hours, including Ronan.</p><p>“—backwood doctors who think this is the worst it can get just ‘cause they belong to some small-dick, hick town. Nothing ever happens here; most exciting news is K tries to off himself! What’ll they think up at Aglionby, huh? Think I’ll make the newspaper?” Kavinsky chuckled dramatically, but barely paused. “Like this is even the worst I’ve fucking done. If I were in Newark, they’d’a thrown me out by now—need room for the cut up, drugged up mobsters and hobos. I’m alive, I’m breathing, badda-boom, let me out.”</p><p>“Somehow, I doubt your rich ass would come second to some mobsters and hobos,” Ronan commented.</p><p>“Right, and you’re the shithead who brought me here!” Kavinsky pointed at Ronan violently. The guard in the corner just turned a page in his magazine, clearly used to Kavinsky’s vitriol by now. “I spend a few days with you and suddenly you think you’ve got the right to break into my fucking house.”</p><p>“Your front door was open.”</p><p>“Go sniffing around where you don’t belong. I don’t trespass on your property, Lynch; you don’t trespass on mine! Fucking reviving a guy trying to die peacefully. I’d’a fallen asleep if you hadn’t showed up. Been gone without the pain and panic. ‘Stead you had to come, wagging your dick, and ruin things. You were unconscious and didn’t let me be!” Kavinsky paused to take a breath, so Ronan interrupted.</p><p>“You’re angry at me for saving your life,” he deadpanned.   </p><p>“Yes, jizz stain! Why do you think I was in that tub?”</p><p>“Is this all really why you’re angry?” Ronan asked, sensing Gansey’s voice coming out in his tone.</p><p>Kavinsky was silent as he stared for a while before finally chortling lowly. Then he outright laughed. “Why didn’t you stay, huh?” Kavinsky asked and it took Ronan too long to figure out what Kavinsky was talking about.</p><p>“I came as soon as they let me.”</p><p>“You didn’t stay.”</p><p>“I’m here now.”</p><p>“You. Didn’t. Stay. Shit bucket.”</p><p>“I couldn’t,” Ronan admitted.</p><p>“Why the hell not?”</p><p>“What difference does it fucking make? I wasn’t allowed back, and you were unconscious.”</p><p>“I woke up!”</p><p>“Why the hell did you do it?” Ronan barked back at him. There was a long pause.</p><p>“Is that it, then, Lynch? You were so broken up over my attempt on my life—which I’ve done before and you know it—that you had to go drive yourself into a ditch somewhere and cry over the existentialism of it all?”</p><p>“I was covered in your blood, K. I was scaring the locals.” Ronan didn’t mention that driving into a ditch and crying over the existentialism of it all was precisely what he had done.</p><p>“You love that shit.” Kavinsky waved off his excuse.</p><p>“Not when they’re thinking of calling the cops.”</p><p> Kavinsky guffawed and then leaned forward to whisper, “did I remind you of you?” Ronan’s flinch was miniscule, but Kavinsky saw. He sat back and grinned too wide, clearly happy to have gotten a reaction.</p><p>“Reminded me of what I put my friends through,” Ronan answered, and Kavinsky snorted.</p><p>“I don’t have friends. You see anyone here?”</p><p>“Matter of fact, I do, shithead,” Ronan barked. He was convinced the only reason the dream pack wasn’t sitting in the waiting room was because they were all out of town. Ronan was too chicken to call them up and let them know what Kavinsky did to himself. He knew it was stupid of him, but how did one even communicate this over text? No chance in hell was he calling.</p><p>Ronan leaned forward to rest his arms on his knees. “Why’d you do it, K?”</p><p>“Why’d’ya you think?”</p><p>“I don’t know.”</p><p>“There’s a lot of shit you don’t let yourself know, Ronan. Figure it the fuck out.” Kavinsky rested his head against his pillow and didn’t say another word. Ronan remained for a short while, pondering in the silence.</p><p>When Ronan reentered the waiting room, Gansey stood. “How is he?”</p><p>“Spitting.” Ronan led the way back out to the Camaro.</p><p>“Good.” Gansey nodded. “Some fire is needed to survive.”</p><p>“What if the fire is what’s killing him?” Ronan allowed Gansey’s metaphor.</p><p>“Tame it, Ro. Don’t blow it out.” Gansey gave him a twitch of his lips.</p><p>“Bring balance to the force, padawan,” Noah said at Ronan’s shoulder, and Ronan jumped, cursing, before wrapping his arm around Noah’s neck and ruffling his hair.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Summary: Kavinsky tries to kill himself. Ronan stops him from dying and subsequently has a mental breakdown of his own. Gansey and Noah help him through it. K's getting therapy now, though he's pissed at Ro for saving him.</p>
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